


This Feels Like Falling in Love

by orphan_account



Category: One Direction (Band)
Genre: AU, Fluff without Plot, M/M, dont blame me, i still can't tag, set in the 80s
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-07-11
Updated: 2014-07-11
Packaged: 2018-02-08 11:03:58
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,602
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1938516
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>zayn doesn’t know if it’s a secret, but he keeps it to himself like one</p>
            </blockquote>





	This Feels Like Falling in Love

**Author's Note:**

> So basically I posted part of this a while back, abandoned it, and revamped it on a train. Fingers crossed this is better.

**A Diner in San Francisco**

harry is happy and charming with an air of cheerfulness to him. zayn’s only known him for twenty minutes yet he’s never been so sure of such an assumption. he seems content to make idle conversation with zayn even though they’ve only just met on the train, _if we’re gonna be stuck on this train together for four days, we should at least try to get to know each other, yeah?_ and zayn feels as if he knows harry’s entire life story already.

by the second day, zayn learns harry’s got nothing to run from yet leaves everyone behind, but he just likes to move is all, and he wants to see the world (“You can’t live your life in one place. You’ll feel trapped!”).

by the third day, zayn tells harry that he’s got everything to run from, yet no one to leave behind. he never really had plans to see the world but figured california was the closest escape from it.

by the fourth day, zayn finds himself having a conversation with harry that somehow leads to him agreeing to live with harry, wherever harry’s staying at, at least until zayn can get his own place (“you’re planning to go to seattle, i can plan to go to seattle...it’s logical”). zayn doesn’t think it’s a particularly good idea, he only just met harry four days ago yet his trust in harry seems to exceed those four days. he agrees with a bit more coaxing from harry (“it’s the 80s. c’mon, live a little!”). he’s only mildly concerned for his safety.

 

zayn thinks maybe he was right in thinking this was a bad idea. he and harry only have enough money for one night at a dilapidated motel. there’s only one bed and an old chair, and zayn is too nice to take the bed for himself but the chair looks ready to fall apart and the floor is covered in suspicious stains. he and harry share the bed. 

once he and harry get tucked into the tiny bed (definitely not made for two people), harry whispers into the dark room _i want paris to be my last stop._ he says it like it’s confidential, delicately and wistfully. 

zayn doesn’t know if it’s a secret, but he keeps it to himself like one. 

 

harry gets them both a job at a diner down the street and a tiny apartment right above it to live in together the next day. he’d left while zayn stalled on his last cigarette behind the motel, promised a quick return. he was meant to be looking for cheap food that wouldn’t give them food poisoning, only he had found them something better.

“the pay will probably be shit,” harry explains unnecessarily. “and the apartment is even worse but fuck, it’s something at least.”

“it’s okay. i’ve settled for worse,” zayn says dismissively, and it doesn’t even come out as piteous as he thought it would. 

 

and the pay is shit, but it gets them food and keeps zayn supplied with cigarettes, even if he has to make them stretch often times than not, and it keeps harry supplied with records. 

eventually, harry gets antsy though, starts to feel the itch of wanting to move, to leave. they’ve not enough money to get very far, but harry figures if they just work extra hours and resist buying things that aren’t necessities, they can make it. 

 

they have (nowhere near) enough money to get to new york a few weeks later. zayn can feel how off harry is today. he knows harry’s been trying to save every penny until they get to new york, has even forfeited his usual calls home because he thinks payphones are too expensive for them right now. but zayn sees the way harry’s eyes travel to the payphone, looks on longingly as other people make calls to their loved ones. so he gives harry the money he’d been saving for that pack of cigarettes during the ride to new york, and tells harry to call his mom and sister (go on, before the train gets here). harry looks grateful, accepts the money and thanks zayn, but--

he doesn’t ask why zayn doesn’t make the call home, too. he never does. 

 

**Or Maybe a Bed and Breakfast in New York**

it takes four days, three hundred dollars total, to get to new york. they spend most of the time talking (mostly harry describing all the places he’s been since he turned nineteen one fateful year) and eating cheap food and pretending that everything’s okay. 

on day one on the train, harry finds some change hidden in the depths of their train seat and uses it to call his mother once more. by night time, his call home sparks some curiosity within him and, he’s not sure what single thing possesses him to do it other than his habit of wanting to know too much, he whispers to zayn the one question he’s wanted an answer to since that first night in california. 

“why don’t you ever call home?” the question wasn’t really meant to leave harry’s mouth but he always ends up saying what he thinks. he rushes to apologize, to tell zayn _i don’t know why i asked, you don’t have to answer that,_ but zayn starts to answer before he gets a chance to.

“if i picked up the phone, paid fifty cents to call home, there’d be no one to pick up on the other end.” zayn says this with a hopeless smile, a smile that says i know, it’s sad but i’ve accepted it. and, just like everything they’ve done together--impulsive and brisk, harry kisses zayn. it’s not very sweet, not loving or chaste, but it’s quick and it’s jarring. it’s _zayn and harry._

when they pull back from the kiss, they don’t say anything for a few minutes until--

“why do you wanna go to paris?” zayn says softly. 

“what?”

“paris. you always talk about how you want paris to be your last stop. what’s in paris that you want?”

and it takes harry awhile to answer the question. he never really had to answer that question out loud, no one’s ever asked him. “it’s not really what’s in paris, more like what i can do in paris. what i can bring.”

“and that is?”

“love.” 

and that doesn’t really answer the question properly, but they both let it go and just let the conversation fade into the quietude of the night (it’s all quite nostalgic zayn thinks, it reminds him of that first night in california). 

and zayn thinks this may be a secret, but to be safe, he keeps it to himself like one. 

 

their last stop before new york is in ohio. they’ve not got enough time to order any food, and not enough money on them just yet, but they seem content to walk around and just look. 

“we should do that,” harry says abruptly, stopping them in their tracks and pointing to the quaint, little bed and breakfast on the corner. 

“what? get something to eat? we’d need money to do that”

“no, like start a bed and breakfast. when we get to paris.”

“...we’d need money to do that,” zayn repeats, “and stability.”

“that hasn’t stopped us before,” harry counters cheerfully, and then he continues to walk as if he hadn’t said a single thing. 

_this might not have been the greatest of ideas_ , zayn thinks, and not for the first time.

he follows after harry anyhow. 

 

**But I Think We'll be Okay with a Bistro in Paris**

 

they don’t actually get the chance to own a bistro, but they do get to work at one. and it isn’t very pretty, but the pay is better than what they’re used to. zayn picks up work on the side drawing caricatures for eager tourists. things are great for awhile, and zayn doesn’t find himself asking if this was such a good idea, not as often as before. but of course not everything is so black and white.

“hey, things are going pretty well for us, aren’t they?” harry whispers during the late hours of the night, early hours of the morning. 

“yeah, i suppose they are,” zayn replies. and he thinks he already knows where this conversation is going, so not wanting to sound too optimistic and jinx everything, he tacks on a _for now._

"i was talking to miss pattie today," and the conversation starts, "she was telling me about a friend she knew who flew to paris. fell in love with it and opened a boutique." harry pauses--gives zayn a chance to catch up, and gets a hm zayn letting him know that he's listening. 

"i was thinking...we could do that ya know? or maybe not a boutique, maybe a bistro or something."

"i mean, we could try that someday," zayn replies. "we waste time doing everything else. why not this?"

and right after zayn turns over to sleep away the stress of the day, right before zayn closes his eyes, he hears harry say _do you think we have enough money to go to paris?_

 _not at all_ zayn replies. _we'll make it anyhow_ zayn doesn't say. 

 

 

zayn remembers harry asking him on one not-particularly-bad but also not-particularly-good day, in the most wishful of voices, _“do you believe in fate?” “I believe that life is a game, and we are merely its game pieces,”_ zayn had replied, not a truth, not a lie, not a confession.

and so the game is played.

**Author's Note:**

> Title from Ed Sheeran-Kiss Me. Thanks for reading, yo. 
> 
> Also, I'm on tumblr at butterscotchandvanillarum


End file.
